'Mosul Question, Lausanne 1922-1923 and after - Papers, despatches, speeches - Hotel de la Mer at Lausanne - Correspondence about oil' [‎54v] (110/501)

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-But let us examine the argument a little more closely in reference to the present
case Ihe first proposition of the article is that the plebiscite is to be held in areas
populated exclusively by an Arab majority.' It is difficult to understand how any
area can be populated exclusively by a majority since the existence of a majority
implies the existence of minorities also. But further it is the contention of the
Turks themselves that the Arabs are not in a majority in the Mosul Vilayet, but
that they are outnumbered by the other elements in the population, viz., Kurds and
Turks; and that this is the case is shown by the figures of the second table to which
reference has been made, and which reveal a total of 454,720 Kurds and 65,895
Turks or Turkomans, as compared with 185,763 Arabs. Therefore, if the Turks
are to claim a plebiscite, it would seem that their argument does not admit of its
bein? applied to the Mosul Vilayet, because the Arabs are not in a majority there.
But, thirdly, supposing the argument to apply to the entire area, irrespective of
majorities or minorities, it has already been pointed out that such a plebiscite has
already twice been held and that on each occasion it has resulted in a verdict hostile
to the Turkish claim. In 1919 the inhabitants of the Mosul Vilayet voted
unanimously in favour of continued incorporation with Bagdad and Basra. In 1921
the whole of the Arabs, the Kurds of the adjacent districts and the whole of the
Turkomans (with the exception of Kirkuk) voted again for inclusion in a State of
Irak, and chose the Emir Feisal as their King.
But the article in the Pact introduces another and still more fantastic distinc
tion. According to it, only those portions of territory which were occupied by enemy
forces on the 30th October, 1918, are to be allowed thus to decide their destinies. On
that day the British forces were about 30 miles distant on the south from Mosul,
which they entered immediately afterwards. We are thus led to this absurd result
that the Arabs who live in the entire territory south of the armistice line are to be
invited to dispose of their fate four years later by plebiscite, while the Arab popula
tion of Mosul town itself, who form more than one-third of the Arab population of
the whole vilayet, are to be deprived of that right. The case has only to be stated to
demonstrate the absurdity of such a claim. It is perhaps unnecessary to add that
armistice conditions have nothing to do with the provisions of peace treaties and that
no European peace treaty made since the armistice of 1918 has attempted to follow
the lines of occupation laid down in the armistice which preceded them.
Finally, a claim, equally untenable and even more incomprehensible, is put
forward in the second half of the article, which reads : “ The whole of those parts,
whether within or outside the said armistice line, which are inhabitated by an
Ottoman Moslem majority, united in religion, in race and in aim, imbued with
sentiments of mutual respect for each other and of sacrifices and wholly respectful
of each other’s racial and social rights and surrounding conditions, form a whole
which does not admit of division for any reason in truth or in ordinance.” It may
be remarked in passing that the word “ Ottoman ” is not easily understood in this
context. The sympathy which unites Moslem peoples is generally recognised; it is
a matter of religion; but it is difficult to appreciate what unity of race can link
together Semitic Arabs, Iranian Kurds and Ural-Altaic Turks, or why the fact that
they have once been forced to submit to Ottoman rule should bind them to remain in
the Ottoman Empire for all time. In fact, the Turkish Government and the Turkish
people are apparently ready at one moment to concede the free determination of their
future destinies to the Arab peoples, and at the next moment to demand that terri
tories inhabited by an Ottoman Moslem majority—a phrase which, if it means
anything at all, applies equally to the Kurdish, Turkish and Arab populations of the
former Turkish Empire—should not be divided “ for any reason in truth or in
ordinance.”
It would appear, therefore, that the claim for the restoration to Turkey of the
Mosul Vilayet is not only prohibited by the considerations, racial, political, historical
and economic, which have been enumerated in the earlier part of this memorandum,
but that it is quite inconsistent with any interpretation that can possibly be applied
to the first article of the National Pact.
Lausanne, December 14, 1922.

'Mosul Question, Lausanne 1922-1923 and after - Papers, despatches, speeches - Hotel de la Mer at Lausanne - Correspondence about oil' [‎54v] (110/501)

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'Mosul Question, Lausanne 1922-1923 and after - Papers, despatches, speeches - Hotel de la Mer at Lausanne - Correspondence about oil' [‎54v] (110/501)

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